Rebecca Gibney's new Halifax series captures Melbourne at its best before COVID-19 crisis

Rebecca Gibney sees herself as “such a Melbourne girl”, and the months spent filming in the city she called home for 20 years were full of reminders of why she loves it so.

That she did so as Jane Halifax made the experience all the more like slipping on a treasured old coat and strolling the banks of the Yarra.

“Melbourne’s changed dramatically, but it’s such an iconic city – and it’s spectacular,” Gibney says. “Melbourne people haven’t really changed. I love that they dress to go out to the theatre and to dinner; that it’s about art and culture. I loved being back there.”

The city’s evolution was hammered home when she watched old episodes of Halifax fp, which aired as 21 telemovies between 1994 and 2002 and brought Gibney the sort of following envisioned by writer Roger Simpson when he created the character of forensic psychiatrist Jane Halifax especially for her.

She always knew there was more to Jane’s story, and is delighted that Halifax: Retribution, screening on Nine as a seven-episode drama series, showcases the maturity of character, actor and city alike.

“The beautiful thing about Halifax this time around is we’re making Melbourne very much a character in the series,” Gibney says of filming in late 2019, before the pandemic.

“The series is about a serial sniper who is shooting people randomly and terrorising Melbourne, and our focus was to film it from the sniper’s perspective a lot of the time.

“And it just makes Melbourne look like the incredible international city that it is. We want people to watch it and go, ‘Wow, that could be New York.’ It has the twinkling lights, the way it’s been shot, it’s very cinematic. And epic; it has a very epic feel. I love that, because Melbourne has that, it’s a very classy city.”

Gibney, now 55, admits she cringed watching old Halifax episodes in preparation for a reboot almost two decades on, thinking she sounded “like a 12-year-old”. She remembers wondering at the time if someone in their late 20s should be playing such a sophisticated role.

Early instalments are a veritable time capsule; in the very first Halifax, Jane and a former beau, played by Andrew McFarlane, stand on the Rialto observation deck with a backdrop of the Docklands. Apart from the original shipping sheds, there’s not a building to be seen. 

What hasn’t changed is Halifax’s ability to attract the best.

“I was very, very grateful that Roger created the character for me,” Gibney says.

“I got to work with the cream of Australian talent – Hugo Weaving, Guy Pearce, Hugh Jackman, Jacquie McKenzie, Deborah Lee-Furness, Sacha Horler, a youthful Richard Roxburgh, the list goes on.”

McKenzie, Anthony LaPaglia and Claudia Karvan headline a cast this time around that ensures Retribution keeps the star quality coming.

The series begins with Jane, now a university professor, living happily in a bayside suburb with a partner and a 22-year-old stepdaughter she adores.

A dramatic and devastating incident propels her back into the field, and into a life she thought she’d left behind. “People don’t want to watch happy families, unless you’re watching Rafters,” she laughs.

Her personal script has reached a point of settled contentment.

She met husband Richard Bell when he was production designer on the latter episodes of Halifax fp, and they have a 16-year-old son, Zac.

While earning acclaim in Packed To The Rafters and more recently Winter and Wanted, and through film roles in Mental and The Dressmaker, their little family has lived in Tasmania’s Tamar Valley, Sydney and Brisbane, before returning to the couple’s native New Zealand for a stint in Queenstown.

Now they’re on 12 hectares, 20 minutes south of Dunedin. Gazing at the Southern Ocean, she reflects on change and growth with good humour – over having become a virtual “fly-in, fly-out” actor who goes where the work is, but also about this place that brings her comfort and joy between assignments.

“We’re up on a hill overlooking the massive ocean; I feel very lucky, I love it here. I’m 15 minutes from an international airport – we’re so global now as people, you’ve got to move with the times.”

A dual citizen, she wrestles with feeling like she should be on the other side of “the ditch” no matter where she is. It emboldens Gibney with a sense of what it is to be an ANZAC; Australia’s response to the Christchurch shootings moved her deeply, and she feels blessed to have a foot in both camps.

A recent encounter with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in an airport lounge completed “the biggest girl crush I ever had”.

She’s humbled to have Ardern at her country’s helm, and proud of her twin ties. “I’m an Australian-New Zealander – I wouldn’t have my career if it wasn’t for Australia. And I still talk like an Australian, as everyone said when I came home!”

Zac was five when Gibney won a Gold Logie in 2009, and so miffed with his mother’s job that he’d turn the television off whenever she appeared on screen.

Then, he loved Steve Irwin and wanted to be a zoologist. Now he wants to be an actor, telling Gibney he’s going to the Victorian College of the Arts. 

“I told him you have to audition, and he said, ‘Oh, I’ll get in.’ He’s got that wonderful thing of being young and bullet-proof, and I encourage that.”

Her greatest triumph is his kindness. “He’s very much aware of other people and their needs.”

Gibney lived in a Toorak townhouse for four months while shooting Halifax: Retribution, and loved slipping back into Melbourne life alongside friends including Jane Hall, Jane Kennedy, Donna Dainty and Kerry Armstrong. It was also a reminder of the dark places the series goes. 

“At times I felt like Jane Halifax – I’d come home at the end of the day, alone, to my solitary glass of red wine. Tragic, lonely girl!”

But she found beauty in playing a cherished character again, bringing “a bit more nous, a bit more wisdom” to the role. 

Jane – and Melbourne – are part of her, and she’s sure they’ll be together again. “To be given the opportunity to bring her back, it’s been wonderful – and hopefully she’s back to stay. There’s a few stories in the old girl yet.”

Halifax: Retribution launches Tuesday, August 25 at 8.45pm on Nine